You Won’t Believe What’s Found To Cause Chronic Diseases

You’ve already heard that, on average, human beings need eight hours of sleep a day. Realistically, many people live fast paced, at-a-moment’s-notice lifestyles that leave them running on less than six hours of sleep a day, sometimes running on caffeine, adrenaline and no sleep at all!

“As long as the work gets done,” you say, thinking you are only compromising the master clock that is your sleep cycle. But scientists have discovered that your body has many clocks and without regular sleep and eating schedules, your health can be impacted in more ways than you think.

When your sleep and eating patterns get out-of-wack, your hunger hormones go up and your blood sugar levels go out of control. This can cause severe metabolic diseases such as type 2 diabetes and obesity.

The Master Clock

Our bodies operate on a circadian clock system – a system of biological clocks. The system regulates internal rhythms like sleep/wake cycles, as well as responses to stimuli like light and food.

Our master clock is set by a light-dark cycle and our bodies are programmed to do certain things depending on the time of day. When it’s night time, the master clock lets the other clocks in your body know that it’s night time – time to do night things like sleep and slow down.

Only a small percentage of people can maintain a healthy weight through diet and exercise alone

One of the things that the master clock tells the other clocks in your body to do at night, is stop eating. Your metabolism slows down and your body plans to retire for the day. But you have other plans. Your midnight snack that you insist on having overrides your “stop eating” signals.

Now the clock in your pancreas is forced to produce insulin to help you digest your meal. Long term, these counter intuitive eating habits can reset the clock in your pancreas. You’ll begin to feel hungry late at night while the rest of your body just wants to sleep. This imbalance can make it much harder for you to lose weight.

In fact, in the International Journal of Obesity, researchers found that the times that you eat influence how much weight you lose. People who ate their main meal earlier in the day lost 25% more weight than those who ate at later times. They also found that big breakfasts and smaller dinners also improve weight loss.

Drugs Are Affected By Our Body Clocks Too

Have you ever heard your doctor say, “take one pill in the morning, and one in the evening?” They say this because a drug’s potency varies depending on the time of day. The liver is better at detoxifying substances at certain times, which may be the reason for a drugs potency variance.

Overall, your internal clocks need to tick in synch like a well-practiced orchestra to improve your health and maximize your body’s potential. For many of us who work double or overnight shifts, this can be hard to do. But researchers are looking into ways that we can monitor and normalize the different rhythms in our bodies, allowing our biological clocks to adapt to our busy lifestyles.